People are pretty upset about a recent opinion piece published by the New York Times that was supposed to be about the science of being transgender. One writer, German Lopez, even wrote a story for Vox that opened, "What happens when the New York Times gets a professor of clinical psychiatry to look at the research on transgenderism and gender identity? Well, apparently the professor gets every study he looked at wrong."

Part of the problem is that though the professor in question, Dr. Richard A. Friedman, is a professor of clinical psychiatry, he's not an expert on transgender issues.

So while he did explore a few interesting things in his story -- like research showing that some of the brain connections in transgender people are different than those in the brains of cisgender people, for example -- Friedman also misinterpreted several other studies, perpetuated some of the most common and damaging myths about transgender people, and offered some bad advice to parents of trans kids. Like, really bad advice that could be dangerous for trans kids.

Here's a quick breakdown of what Dr. Friedman's story got wrong about trans youth.

'Being trans is the same as being gender-non-conforming'

As Lopez points out in his Vox story, this misunderstanding is at the heart of why Friendman ends up doling out such bad advice.

Being transgender means that the gender you were assigned at birth doesn't match up with your inward perception of your own gender identity. "Gender dysphoria" can happen if that disconnect makes you feel anxious, disoriented, or depressed because your perception of yourself is different from other peoples' perception of you. Sometimes medical treatment -- like gender-affirming surgery -- is used to treat gender dysphoria.

Being gender non-conforming is different, in that it's not your gender identity that's at stake -- it's your gender expression. For example, you could identify as a guy, but like to wear makeup, you could identify as a girl who prefers to present boyishness to the world, or you might prefer a gender expression that falls somewhere between male and female -- or represents both, or neither.

Basically, any expression of gender that breaks the rules around society's definitions of what's "normal" for boys or girls can be considered gender non-conforming. But preferring to express your gender in a way that's non-traditional doesn't have anything to do with gender dysphoria (or with sexual orientation, for that matter) -- they're separate concepts.

But according to Lopez's Vox story, "Friedman looks at research that analyzed both identity and expression, but attempts to apply the research's findings only to gender identity."

"This is ... a very common mistake in analyses of gender research," Lopez explains. A lot of old studies look at outdated definitions or mix up concepts like gender identity and expression. So when people like Friedman come along and try to apply these findings to our current understanding of gender identity, they end up -- perhaps inadvertently -- conflating different concepts."

In other words, Friedman thought they were the same thing, but they aren't -- and that mistake negatively influenced all of his other ideas.

'Trans kids don't really know themselves yet'

Because of his confusion over the difference between trans and gender non-comforming kids, Friedman drew some very incorrect conclusions about the percentages of young kids who report experiencing gender dysmorphia but eventually "grow out of it."

In an earlier Vox report on the myths surrounding trans kids, Lopez spoke with Diane Ehrensaft, the director of mental health at the UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital's Child and Adolescent Gender Center, who said that actually, research suggests that trans kids usually do know themselves -- even at a very early age.

Dr. Ehrensaft broke it down for Lopez, who wrote: "Parents and doctors should watch for consistence, persistence, insistence, and history of gender nonconformity, which can be evaluated early on to tell if a child is trans. But, above all, she said parents should foster a supportive environment that lets kids drive the process of establishing their own identity."

Lopez concluded what every young person already knows about parenting: "Refusing to accept children for who they are has seriously detrimental consequences."

Trans kids deserve better than this. We can start by believing them.